Influence of Noise on the Signal Quality of Quantum-Dot Semiconductor Optical Amplifiers

We use a semiconductor optical Bloch equation approach combined with a traveling wave equation for the electric field to explore the effect of noise on the signal quality of a quantum-dot(QD) semiconductor optical amplifier. Using a stochastic white noise source for the spontaneous emission inside the QDs, we can show that there is a tradeoff between amplification performance and signal quality. Nevertheless, optimized operation conditions exist and are discussed for various input signals.